New Artwork – Ian Rogers – a Quarrel of Sparrows

Another collective noun – today, a Quarrel of Sparrows. Today, I learned that I really should try to forget everything I thought I knew about birds. When I was a kid, my dad would point out the names of all the birds we saw. For years, I thought that male starlings were grackles. Today, I learned that what I thought were chickadees are, in fact, male sparrows. Thanks, Dad.

It is pretty funny watching wee little sparrows knocking the living heck out of each other; they really tussle. For all their tininess, they take their fighting very seriously and go at it all the time. A “quarrel” is a pretty appropriate group name, I think.